I just found out last night that the inequity of the regions does not affect only the under 25 crowd. Here's the breakdown of the number of ladies competing at the Championship Masters Level at the upcoming Adult Sectionals:

Easterns: 17 ladies

Mids: 15 ladies

and Pacifics? FIVE

That's right. Five. And the top four in each region get to go.

I'm so bitter...I have to beat 13 good ladies to make it. Next year I'm joining a west coast club!

On the one hand, I'm thrilled that the numbers for Adult skating are increasing, since Adult Easterns and Mids have been steadily growing in number every year, but Pacifics has actually decreased! It's great for Adult skating in the long run. But I'm sad for myself and my fellow competitors who have been in Adult Nationals a long time (7+ years for me!) and who have been steadily improving, who work so hard to try to make the Championships just once.

Oh well. If I do make top 4, I'll just have more to celebrate about I guess.

Yeah, it seems the Easterns events have all had increased numbers over last year. There are 6 master men (4 last year) and 9 gold men (5 last year, with one who could not make it to AN even though he qualified). Not as bad as for the ladies, but now unless there are a rash of withdrawals, qualifying for AN is not trivial for the Eastern men this year.

Again, contrast with other sections: in Mids, 3 master men & 2 gold men. How _is_ the real estate in the Chicago area anyway? Pacifics for some reason also have a low turnout of men, and they usually have the most master & gold men of all three sections.

FIVE WOMEN in Pacific Coast Sectional!?!?!?!? I'm surprised! There's usually so many women from the All Years FSC alone!?!?!

Only 3 Master's Men in Midwestern this year? Can anyone find out how many men in the Pacific Coast Men? (You know where I'm getting at, dcden...) (I personally can think of 2, possibly 3 men in the Pacific Coast myself.)

And you don't have to move to Chicago to be in the skating club, dcden! If you wanna move up...you'll just have to sign up for the club in that regional and be content skating with a different group at Sectionals.

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Cheers,
jazzpants

11-04-2006: Shredded "Pre-Bronze FS for Life" Club Membership card!!!
Silver Moves is the next "Mission Impossible"
(Dare I try for Championship Adult Gold someday???)

Thank you for the support, you guys!!!

Ugh! So much for hoping that there would only be 4 Masters Men including myself at Easterns. This will be my first year competing and I was really wishing for a "free" ride to Nationals...oh well:]

Btw, where is all of this information coming from? Is the schedule out already?

On the other hand, would you want to be that 5th place skater from the Pacific region who does not get to go? How bad will that skater feel?

Actually I'd rather be 5th out of 5, because sometimes someone in the top 4 withdraws before the event... not often, but it happens.

Yes, actually it happened to me last time ANs was in Lake Placid: i was 5th at Sectionals and the winner of my section tore a hamstring and I got to skate. (she was a friend of mine too so I felt really bad for her) So it can happen.

Anyone know how many skaters for Midwestern Gold Ladies? I'm guessing about 20(!). It makes me wonder, how come they don't have elimination rounds with so many skaters?

By the by, I'm actually skipping my rink's annual Ice Theatre show to go to Mids. this year (they just had to fall on the same weekend!). A lot of people are disappointed that I'm not in this year's show. I have worked hard all year to do well at Mids. and Nats., but will missing the show really be worth it?

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This space has been put on hiatus for retuning....

It actually happened last year at Pacifica Coast Sectionals. Nick Chou had an off night and ended up in 5th place. Someone dropped out and he skated as an alternate at Nationals and WON the Championship Gold Men!!! (Of course, being that he's a friend of mine and knowing how wonderful his skating is, I was REALLY HAPPY for him!)

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Cheers,
jazzpants

11-04-2006: Shredded "Pre-Bronze FS for Life" Club Membership card!!!
Silver Moves is the next "Mission Impossible"
(Dare I try for Championship Adult Gold someday???)

Thank you for the support, you guys!!!

Does the USFSA apply "fill-up" rules to Adult Nationals? If there are only 2 Masters men in Mids and 6 in Easterns, I think all should go. It's not really fair for the 5th and 6th place finishers.

Currently I beleive fill-up rules don't apply. Huge bummer for the men. (doesn't affect the women in any region, I don't think)

Thats quite an imbalance there... lucky we don't have quailfiers yet but it would be good when that day comes... which means more skaters here... heres to top four for you

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Tidesong

Yep - because you'll be skating in the same event as me! (I had to withdraw from last year's event due to injury, so I am really looking forward to this years.)

You know, I wonder if attendance is down on the Pacific coast because AN is on the other side of the country - travel expenses might be out of reach for some? Just guessing.

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"The only place where success comes before work is in a dictionary." -- Vidal Sasson

"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Unknown

I'm bumping this up because I still don't know how many Gold Ladies there are for Championship Adult Mids. I'm afraid to ask Joyce @ Brooklyn FSC because I want to know, but I don't want to know, if you know what I mean....

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Black Sheep!

Who cares how many ladies are there. The most important person there will be YOU as far as your friends and family are concerned. Focus on you and your goals for this competition and forget the rest. You won't remember the other skaters a year from now, but you will remember how skate. Make it a good one.

PS - take extra tapes/cds

Amen!

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Hi Black Sheep. I can guarantee that there are at least two - you and me!

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"The only place where success comes before work is in a dictionary." -- Vidal Sasson

"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Unknown

You actually won the Championships one year, so I have no sympathy. Ha! Ha!

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But I think manleywoman won Championship Gold, and she is talking about Championship Masters. Quite a different set of competitors! All very good, too.

Anyone know if they are going to combine any of the Young Adult events at Easterns? I am scared because last year they combined Silver and Gold, rather than Silver and Bronze, and I just "moved up" to Silver this year. I don't have an axel or any doubles. The girls in Gold last year were really good!

Nor should you, since I'm not asking for any! True, I won Gold once, for which I'm thrilled. Especially since I started at the bottom of Gold for many years and worked hard to get to get a medal.

I was actually speaking more about the inequity of the regions. I have lots of east coast friends who would love to just be in the Championship event once who are bummed about having to compete against so many others while Pacifics is so much easier. I've gone once to the Championship Masters event, so at least I can say that. But I feel for my other east coast friends who are getting older (though better!) who would like to make it. They're all joking too about switching to west coast clubs!

Personally, I've been skating well lately, so I'm just going to go out there and do what I can do with a smile, and hope it's enough. But I'll be happy when it over and I can get a drink in my hand!

Hi,
I guess it's for this reason that I think it's bizzare to have the gold event and then a gold championship event. In the majority of the gold and gold championships, it's the same people competing. Because of the differences in numbers in the regions the "best" skaters are not always the ones in the championship gold event.
With the gold event at AN, everyone competes to qualify, and thus there's often a truer representation of the top skaters. Of course I realize that this can also happen in the open event if there are several flights and depending on what skaters are in what flight - but there is a lower probabilty of this as there are more skaters in the open event (and the mix of the groups is not geographical but random).
I know that this is patterned after the standard track, and because of the greater number of skaters this method is necessary and more successful at bringing the "top" skaters. But again we are not "standard" skaters - we're adults. Just based on the stats and probability alone I don't think the numbers are great enough or the regional distribution equitable enough for the championship event. For me it would be more meaningful to go to nationals and compete against the entire field.
So, bla,bla bla for this reason, I tend to go to the gold events and skip the championship gold event.

True, but the open events are seperated by age, so as we get older (ie a 3 or 4, for example), we may not be as competitive as we once were against 1's and 2's. So for that reason, the championship event makes sense to me.

What I'd like to see, though, is a rule saying that if you qualified for the championship event you cannot compete in the open event (the USFSA would refund your open event entry fee). Theoretically, if you are one of the top four finishers in your region, then you are skating at a higher level than someone entering an open event. You could see it in Gold II last year - out of the top eight skaters, five of them had skated in the championship event. (Nobody below 8th had). Without them in the open event, it would have been much more competitve for the other skaters (although the winner was not in the championship event).

Anyway, food for thought......

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"The only place where success comes before work is in a dictionary." -- Vidal Sasson

"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Unknown

Skater1964, I agree with what you said, "Theoretically, if you are one of the top four finishers in your region, then you are skating at a higher level than someone entering an open event", but for the standard track and not in the adult events. In reality because of the inequity of the number of skaters in the regions this is not the case. I think that the better skaters do compete in both events. If 5 of the 8 top Gold II skaters were in the championship event, then we don't need two gold events.

Anyone competing Silver I? My first year as a non Young Adult, so I am a little nervous, expecially without an axel. I'm just hoping to skate a clean program.